I happen to be a software enthusiast. I enjoy operating systems and user interfaces. I do compile kernels, though I have not modified one. I do often test systems, especially their installation, configuration, and initial usage. My aim is to help systems to become easier to install and use every day.

Sunday, April 29, 2012

Which Debian-based Linux distributions work best for me and why

Earlier on Saturday, I was using Semplice 2.0.2 for a few hours, but now I am back using Debian Sid.
After using Lubuntu and then antiX core on the Lenovo laptop, I can tell
you that all of them are easy and fast to use, but my favorites are the
Debian Sid and its derivatives. I have antiX core and siduction on the
Lenovo as my Debian Sid derivatives, and I have antiX core, Semplice,
and Debian Sid itself on the Gateway.

If you're going to use a
Sid based system, then, to my way of thinking, there is no better one
than Sid itself. However, if you are starting fresh from scratch, I'd
pick antiX core as the one that gives you a few more tools to work with,
and siduction, by a hair, over Semplice, in terms of complete,
prepared, ready to go systems. For all of them, I like adding the smxi
tool. Yes, I can configure them all without smxi, but smxi just makes
the task faster and simpler, regardless of what aptosid and siduction
developers say about using the free stuff only and sticking with the
core system. If we want to do that, then forget them: use just Debian
Sid!

So in the Debian Sid world, Debian Sid and antiX core, for
me, get the nod, but I have to say, working with Semplice today, I've
pretty much (gradually) taken out their stuff and put in the stuff I
use, so there is very little difference between Debian Sid, antiX core,
and Semplice for me. Same goes for siduction; they're all quite good.

In
the Debian Testing arena, again, what can be better than Debian Testing
itself? Once the system is completely set up, no need to go elsewhere.
If you are starting from scratch, however, it's hard to beat antiX
base. The antiX M12.0 base edition, even though there are some
packaging defects, documentation, and tools still to be polished and
finished, is one of the best there is, and antiX M11.0, already
released, was a great release last year. If I were starting fresh
(which I did recently, I would not hesitate to use antiX M12.0 Test 2
base, or any of the internal test builds that are taking place right
now. But there are a few other good Debian Testing derivatives that
also work quite well. One that I like, and I have installed on my
Lenovo, is ZevenOS. I have Version 2.0, the "Neptune Edition". No
reason for me to get any newer release, because Neptune looks nice and
is just as up to date as any newer releases they may have come out with
since then. Starting fresh, sure, grab the latest version, but for me,
"Neptune" does very well.

For Debian Stable, that's one area
where I think you can do better than the Debian release. SimplyMEPIS,
to me, adds demonstrable value. It's much faster and easier to install,
and you can choose to either stick with it, as is, and "age" it nicely,
as Debian itself does, or you can, as you need them, add newer software
packages from the MEPIS CR - their Community Repository. Debian Stable
is great, of course, and that's where the great software comes from.

Canonical,
though often criticized for not making many direct software
contributions to Linux or to Debian, actually DOES provide contributions
in several ways. First, the marketing that Canonical does for desktop
software is something that not only Debian, but the entire Linux
ecosystem has needed for years. Red Hat provides what's needed on the
server side of things. SUSE has done good things on both the desktop
and the server, but Canonical has made more inroads, offering four or
five of their own sponsored derivatives, and they always seem to be in
the news about something in free software. But something that not many
people see is that they DO give back to the Debian project. There are
numerous bug fixes that make their way back to either Debian Sid or
Debian Testing from Canonical's efforts, and in addition to that, tools
like update-manager have, over the years, seen their way to Debian, and
the simplicity that Ubuntu and its derivatives have added to the
installation and configuration process have slowly, but surely, made
their way into many Debian projects, so that Debian itself is no longer
that difficult beast to install or use, so Canonical can be thanked for
their role in that.

As far as Ubuntu derivatives that I like, in
the Canonical camp, my favorite by far is Xubuntu. I like it nearly as
much as my Debian systems (which always end up getting Xfce installed on
them). Xubuntu is Canonical's community version of Ubuntu that comes
with Xfce instead of GNOME. The first Ubuntu derivative that I actually
started using was Kubuntu. I don't find it quite as stable during
testing as Xubuntu, but released versions are always pretty solid. For
lighter computing than even Xubuntu, the LXDE-based Lubuntu has been
quite useful for fast start up and use mainly when browsing is all
that's planned for the login session.

Personally, I am not a huge
fan of Mint and its derivatives, but there are a couple of them that
are quite popular, beginning with the main Mint (GNOME-based) release.
Mint, which is, in the main version, a Ubuntu derivative, has done a lot
of work to deal with the erratic nature and major changes that have
occurred since GNOME 3 was released. Ubuntu came up with Unity as their
answer. Mint came up with a couple of alternatives, including Cinnamon
and MATE, which have been popular to smooth the transition to the
vastly different desktop style introduced with GNOME 3. I'm not a GNOME
fan, so I usually ignore this stuff, but Mint also has a KDE edition,
an Xfce edition, an LXDE edition, and others as well. But perhaps their
best derivative work started as an experiment: a return to Debian
rolling release testing repository package archives instead of Ubuntu
derived archives. The result is called Linux Mint Debian Edition
(abbreviated LXDE), and it's one of the most popular Debian derivatives,
and probably second only to Mint itself within their community
derivatives. Debian lovers who are also Mint lovers might want to give
it a try. One of my friends who likes Debian, but struggles at times
with software updates has had good success with LMDE.

That's my
summary of what several of the top Debian-based distribution
alternatives are out there right now. There are many other good ones in
addition to these, but for general purpose use, and also for my own
personal use cases, these are the ones that get the most attention from
me.